Test tube babies celebrate Mother’s Day at hospital
試管嬰兒回娘家 媽媽分享幸福

Babies crawl on the floor while their parents look on at Taipei Medical University Hospital on May 11.爸爸媽媽五月十一日在台北醫學大學附設醫院看嬰兒在地上爬。

Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Liberty Times照片：自由時報記者方賓照

Nearly 100 test tube babies and 140 parents attended the “Welcome Back Home Test Tube Babies” event held by Taipei Medical University Hospital’s Center for Reproductive Medicine and Sciences on May 11 to celebrate Mother’s Day, allowing the mothers to share the emotional adversities faced while trying to have children.

“Being a mother is my greatest source of happiness in life,” said one mother at the event, who had traveled to Thailand to search in vain for a surrogate mother. Another mother at the event had tried artificial insemination and in-vitro fertilization (IVF) 14 times before finally getting pregnant.

According to the center’s director Tseng Chi-jui, once a woman reaches 40 the quality of her eggs goes down, significantly decreasing her chances of getting pregnant and raising the risk of miscarriage.

According to the center’s statistics for IVF babies born at the hospital, women under the age of 40 have nearly a 40 percent chance of becoming pregnant, while women under 30 have between a 50 and 60 percent chance of getting pregnant. For infertile couples that would like to have children, it is best for the woman to see a doctor before the age of 40.